My Life as a Fantasy Football Widow

In the last 30-odd hours I have slept in; bought one pair of shoes, three pairs of pants, a shirt and a sweater; watched over three hours of QVC's Day of Beauty (totaling $202.57 in additional purchases by phone); taken a nap; painted my nails; read a book; and reveled in over seven hours of Emmy goodness.

I cannot for the life of me comprehend why any woman would have a problem with football.

Here's a thing, though: I know what size I wear. I also know that I'm thicker than almost every woman in attendance at the Emmy's this year. What I do not know is how these people are able to find clothing in size negative four.

And here's another thing: why, why, why do I so look forward to these awards every single year when I don't watch television? Outside of The West Wing, Alias and the guilty pleasure that is Dr. 90210 I am sadly short on current TV knowledge. I have never seen an episode of The Sopranos and thought Angels in America was a baseball movie.

Yet there I was, watching the Creative Awards on Saturday night.

I don't even know what most of those job titles mean.

And I didn't do it because my beloved B. Whitford was a presenter (with his lovely wife, Jane, whom I conveniently forget, most of the time) - I was looking forward to it.

Why?

I think it's an illness, much like the one that commanded I flip over to the Miss America/Who Wants to Be a Millionaire debacle on commercials.

And the one that drove Speaksy to commandeer the computer today in hopes that The Whammy I taught him might help his fantasy team perform better.

It didn't.

And I seriously hope he forgets that by the time he goes to balance the checkbook tomorrow.

Or maybe I'll just keep those receipts with me until the new satellite dish is installed. With access to every football game played anywhere on the face of the earth comes a kind of generosity I could really use right now...
Juliet

:: happy hour begins at 11:11 PM [+] ::

...

GAH!

This blogging thing has completely gotten away from me. I know there are people for whom writing every day is a snap, but I don't know any of them well enough to sell them my firstborn in return for some wisdom.

I mean, I can't just give the kid away to ANYONE.

Speaking of kids, no, I am not having one so stop that right now.

How do you know I'm not secretly knitting booties over here? Well, besides the obvious too-inept-to-knit thing?

Well, thank you, kind readers, for setting me straight on the whole "charting the way to conception" deal-y by emailing me information on the book Taking Charge of Your Fertility by Toni Weschler, MPH. Fascinating book. Incredible information. Seriously, a must-read for every feminist, or, indeed, anyone with a down-there region sporting decidedly girly parts.

Too bad they didn't show us THIS filmstrip in middle school instead of the one featuring the Farrah-haired bimbo with the uneven hooters.

Y'see, the first couple of weeks your temperature should be low. Then it should be high. Then you should get your period and your temperature should go back down.

When the low goes to high, you've ovulated. Congratulations!

So I take my temperature. I do some seriously odd early-morning self-touching (about which we won't talk because I'm shy like that).

I become one with the beauty that is my feminine form.

And find out that I'M SO STRESSED OUT I CAN'T OVULATE.

WHICH IS STRESSING ME OUT MORE.

Apparently my eggs have decided to hibernate in their cozy styrofoam containers in the back of the fridge until spring, at which point I'm sure I'll burst into the ubertastic ova-thrower the book swears I am. Until then I'll keep waking up at 5am to take my temperature and complete the self-touching checklist.

And I will try not to have attitude about this.

Defined as "no longer screaming at the stupid plastic beeping thermometer".

Because that just can't be good for the whole flowering femininity thing.
Juliet

PS - BTW, I know I've ovulated in other cycles; there's a whole chapter I'll rename, "THAT'S What That Was??", and I'll bet 50% of the two of you who now go buy the book will know EXACTLY what I'm talking about. And you will laugh at me.

:: happy hour begins at 8:28 PM [+] ::

...

The Metamorphosis

"And for a little while he lay quietly, breathing shallowly, as if expecting, perhaps, from the complete silence the return of things to the way they really and naturally were."

This is me the morning after I eat ham.

Readers read because writers write about readers. Okay, so Franz Kafka didn't really have my encounter with a Denny's western omelet in mind when he...well, ever, but that doesn't mean I can't see myself in his story of a man suddenly transformed into a giant insect that has to rock itself off the bed.

Not a far stretch when you consider that my pants don't fit.

Twenty-four hours later.

I'm packed tighter than a can of tomatoes over here.

And what do they tell us to do to combat water retention? Drink more water.

Are you kidding me? I'm makin' like a water yak and I should DRINK MORE WATER? Shoot, it's only a matter of time before they tell us Twinkies are a diet food and the best cure for a headache is a hammer.

Can you hear the hysteria? That's because I just had to kill a spider, something usually nerve-wracking made more so by the fact that if I reach too far in any one direction I'll start listing and eventually sink. Never let go, Jack! I'll never let you go!!

I'm never going back to Denny's again, either. That's for sure.

Damn ham.
Juliet

:: happy hour begins at 8:24 PM [+] ::

...